Rep. Sean Duffy is a Republican congressman from Wisconsin, but you might remember him better from his days on Real World: Boston. Last week at a town hall, Rep. Duffy was asked whether he believed trans-vaginal ultrasounds should be mandatory for abortions, an issue that is currently up for debate in his home state of Wisconsin, as well as in Indiana. A bill mandating trans-vaginal ultrasounds was previously considered in Virginia, but ultimately defeated. Rep. Duffy responded by saying that he didn’t know anything about the legislation, but couldn’t comment on legislating a medical procedure that has been discussed at length in the news lately, other than to say that he “probably agrees” with it. But he doesn’t really know because, he says, “I haven’t had one.”

Well, I have. I’ve had several, in fact. So, Rep. Duffy, pull up a chair and let me explain how a trans-vaginal ultrasound works, and how it feels.

The first time I had a 9 inch-long (230mm) hard plastic cylindrical probe inserted into my vagina, I was 15 years old. I was having extreme, sharp pains in my lower abdomen and was brought to the emergency room by a counselor at my summer music program in upstate New York. After having my first ever pelvic exam performed by an alarmingly young male doctor, I was brought into an ultrasound room. I had only been told that I would have an ultrasound to determine if an ovarian cyst had burst, as they suspected, and I figured it would be like the kind I’d seen them use on pregnant women on TV: on top of the stomach, with the gel. Instead, the male technician showed me the ultrasound wand, instructed me to put my feet in stirrups, and inserted the wand.

The technician pressed the wand against my cervix and pushed it further up and to the right side, prompting a sharp pain that didn’t subside until he finished pressing the wand hard against multiple parts of my insides to get a picture of my ovaries and uterus. The procedure lasted longer than usual because my bladder was too full to get out of the way, so he had to press harder and in more places in order to get a clear image.

In suffering with ovarian cysts and endometriosis for years after that experience, as well as with cervical dysplasia, I have had occasion for several more trans-vaginal ultrasounds. In total, I’ve had 9.

Two of my most recent trans-vaginal ultrasound experiences were when I had an abortion, in early 2010. I first consulted an obstetrician to confirm the pregnancy, and she did a trans-vaginal ultrasound after being unable to see what she needed to see with an external one. They also did one at Planned Parenthood, to confirm the particular procedure they were planning was appropriate to the gestational age and development, and to ensure that I wasn’t so far along that my abortion would be illegal in Texas. That ultrasound was not mandated by Texas law at the time (it is now), but they have always been a standard part of Planned Parenthood’s medical treatment.

That particular trans-vaginal ultrasound was extremely painful too, and not because I was regretting my decision or didn’t want to see the fetus on the screen or hear it described. It just physically hurt. I knew exactly what I was doing; the procedure had been described to me by the nurse, by written materials I was forced to read, and by information I was forced to listen to 24 hours before the procedure. And while some women may regret their decision, and some may have had a tremendously difficult time reaching the decision to be there, every single one of them knows what an abortion is and what it does. That’s why she’s there, and she doesn’t need a hard piece of plastic pressed against her cervix and a visual reminder that she’s pregnant to shame her into keeping a child for which she is unprepared.

If a doctor tells me that I need to have a trans-vaginal ultrasound to determine the gestational age of a pregnancy or to suss out the cause of a gynecological issue, fine. But I’ll be damned if I’m going to let legislators do it to coerce and shame me, and millions of other women.

]]>In opposition to new proposed abortion reporting restrictions in Texas, ten Democratic legislators have sent an open letter to Health and Human Services Executive Commissioner Tom Suehs urging him to not to move forward with the new rules, which would increase the amount of information gathered on abortion-seeking people and require doctors to report vaguely defined “complications” from abortion.

“The proposed rule does not represent the will of the legislative body and, if implemented through rulemaking, would serve to circumvent the legislative process,” wrote the legislators.

The new rules are being proposed after anti-choice, Tea Party-endorsed legislator Rep. Bill Zedler and his past colleagues were repeatedly unable to enact them through democratic means in the Texas Legislature over the past several years. Texas health officials have agreed to look into adopting the failed legislation by rule rather than law. In their letter, the Democratic legislators say this sets a “terrible precedent.”

“If this rule is published and adopted, it sets a terrible precedent and will have serious ramifications for years to come,” write the legislators.

But Texas health officials seem anxious to appease Zedler, though they are increasingly backtracking on initial openness about cooperating with the legislator.

As originally reported by Rewire, at the first public meeting discussing the new requirements in April 2012, Department of State Health Services regulatory unit manager Renee Clack said the meeting was called to discuss “some amendments the department has included that specifically relate to a request by Representative Zedler.”

DSHS’ openness about the origins of their new rule are also illustrated in documents obtained by the Austin Chronicle and shared with Rewire this week. They include a March 21, 2012 memo sent from Department of State Health Services Commissioner David Lakey to Executive Commissioner Suehs “to discuss possible reporting requirements that relate to an amendment by Representative William Zedler.” The memo describes the rules’ background thusly:

During the special session [of the 2011 Texas Legislature] Representative William Zedler offered an amendment to SB 7 that would have added additional abortion reporting requirements. This amendment was not added, but it was agreed that the Health and Human Services Commission and the Department of State Health Services would look at the additonal requirements and determine what elements could be adopted by rule.

The same memo refers to an August 2011 meeting wherein Suehs instructed his staff to “continue working through possible abortion reporting elements to see which elements are within current authority, useful for public health, feasible to obtain and not offensive to women.”

Despite Clack’s statement and repeated Zedler name-dropping in DSHS and HHSC documents, DSHS press representative Carrie Williams told the Dallas Observer that Clack “misspoke” and that the requirements are the result of “a general discussion among state leadership that resulted in us agreeing to look into it once it was clear the Rep. Zedler amendment would not be added to SB7,” and not “at his specific request.”

Williams either could not or would not tell the Dallas Observer or Rewire who participated in the “general discussion among state leadership” or why Bill Zedler’s particular, individual wishes are being catered to considering the vast amount of legislation that doesn’t pass into law each session in Texas.

The proposed requirements would, among other rules, require abortion-seeking people to report their highest level of education and doctors to report to DSHS, within 30 days, “when abortion complications occur.” The department has provided no guidance on what might constitute a complication or what the consequences for non-compliance might be, despite requests for both from Texas physicians at the intial abortion stakeholders meeting in April.

Texas legislators, in their letter issued this week, are predominantly concerned with what appears to be a blatant subversion of the democratic process by DSHS and HHSC:

The proposed rule stems directly from legislation that has failed over the course of two legislative sessions and that repeatedly did not receive the support of the majority of the Texas Legislature. As such, we should not allow the political agenda of a single member to circumvent the democratic process and the will of the Legislature. If this rule is published and adopted, it sets a terrible precedent and will have serious ramifications for years to come.

It remains to be seen whether the letter will sway Commissioner Suehs. He has not, in the past, been particularly receptive to his pro-choice critics. Earlier this year, he sent angry and dismissive replies to Texans who opposed his signature on a rule that excludes Planned Parenthood from participating in the state’s Medicaid Women’s Health Program, writing, “Are you for real? Who is paying your bills?”

Earlier this month, Suehs announced that he would retire in August, which is before the Health and Human Services Council will meet to discuss the new reporting requirements.

]]>Texas Bureaucrats Listen To, But Do Not *Hear,* Concerns of Providers on Unnecessary Regulationshttps://rewire.news/article/2012/06/15/not-done-texas-health-council-hears-but-doesnt-listen-to-pro-choice-activists/
Fri, 15 Jun 2012 08:21:03 +0000The Texas Department of State Health Services Council met this week to push forward the potential adoption of new abortion reporting requirements drafted at the best of one rogue, anti-choice legislator, but the opposition from pro-choice Texans is finally gaining steam.

The Texas Department of State Health Services Council met this week to do its part in pushing forward the adoption of new abortion reporting requirements enacted at the behest of one anti-choice Texas state representative who failed to get the requirements passed democratically through the Texas Legislature in years past. On Thursday, the DSHS Council approved its proposed version of the new rules, which will be passed on to the Health and Human Services Council later this year for public comment and approval.

But more and more voices are joining the opposition to the requirements, which physicians, abortion providers, and pro-choice Texans are concerned could be used to intimidate abortion-seeking people and abortion-providing doctors–all with the intent of making legal abortion both harder to provide and harder to access in Texas. Sen. Jose Rodriguez of El Paso is the first Texas legislator–and that includes Rep. Bill Zedler himself–to publicly speak out about the requirements.

“We should not allow one member to subvert the will of the legislature and circumvent the democratic process in order to push his personal political, anti-choice agenda,” said Sen. Rodriguez in a press release Thursday afternoon. “If he is successful, there will be serious ramifications for years to come.”

Texas’ staunchly conservative legislature has repeatedly considered versions of these proposed requirements to be too extreme and unnecessary for its approval, declining to pass two of Rep. Bill Zedler’s proposed abortion reporting bills in 2007 and 2011.

The proposed requirements would, among other rules, require abortion-seeking people to report their highest level of education and doctors to report to DSHS, within 30 days, “when abortion complications occur.” The department has provided no guidance on what might constitute a complication or what the consequences for non-compliance might be, despite requests for both from Texas physicians at the intial abortion stakeholders meeting in April.

Critics of the proposed new rules say DSHS and HHSC are willfully ignoring the democratic process in favor of putting into practice, via statute, as much of Rep. Bill Zedler’s failed legislation as they can.

In a May letter to DSHS, Planned Parenthood expresses concern that “these reporting requirements are not the will or intent of the Legislature,” and feature obvious redundancies. For example, the new requirements would demand that abortion providers report whether consent for a minor’s abortion was obtained, while that’s already done in accordance with state law. They also require providers to report the method of pregnancy verification, even though Texas law requires a mandatory sonogram. Therefore, “it is implied in the law that the method of pregnancy verification for a woman who has an abortion is through a sonogram.” Ultimately, the organiziation says the rules “should not be implemented.”

But if DSHS must go through with the requirements as is, Planned Parenthood asks that DSHS provide “background information,” including “a description of the problem which necessitates these rules” and “how these rules will solve the problem.”

So far, DSHS has not been willing to provide Rewire with answers to these same questions, saying that the new requirements “could help from a regulatory perspective and in demographic and trend analysis,” according to DSHS press representative Carrie Williams. DSHS has readily admitted that after Rep. Zedler’s abortion reporting amendment failed to pass in the legislature last year, according to Williams, “HHSC and DSHS agreed to look at the additional requirements and determine what elements could possibly be adopted by rule.”

But the rules themselves are ill-defined according to Sen. Rodriguez, who said today:

“The requirement to report information irrelevant to the services being provided — including the patient’s level of education and how a minor obtained consent — is unnecessary and takes focus away from the delivery of care. Even more concerning is the requirement for physicians to report any ‘complications’ stemming from an abortion. There is no definition for what this means in statute or in the proposed rule.”

Even though abortion stakeholders such as Planned Parenthood and individual abortion-providing physicians and the public have voiced multiple, intersecting concerns about the new rules over the past two months since the DSHS’ first public hearing on the requirements, DSHS appears to have taken none of these concerns–whether they be about redundant requirements, defining “complication” or or simply explaining the need for the rules in the first place–into account or reflected them in any meaningful amendments to the original draft.

Blake Rocap, legislative counsel at NARAL Pro-Choice Texas, says there have been “very few changes made to the original draft rules, except those items that were obviously unworkable or contradictory.” In particular, he says, the DSHS council has “clearly not taken seriously” concerns that the requirements were “drafted at the request of a single member of the legislature,” since “no member of the council would share whether they had knowledge of the origin of these rules” at Thursday’s meeting.

Now, the proposed rules will go on to be approved by the separate Health and Human Services Council this fall. If that council approves the rules, they’ll be published formally in the state’s official Texas Register for a 30-day public comment period before returning to the HHSC for final approval.

]]>Unnecessary Restrictions on Abortion Care: How Democracy Side-Stepping Sausage Is Made, Texas-Stylehttps://rewire.news/article/2012/06/08/not-done-how-democracy-side-stepping-sausage-is-made-texas-style/
Fri, 08 Jun 2012 08:27:34 +0000How did one Texas legislator get the state Department of Health Services to enact requirements on abortion care that failed to pass even the Texas legislature? Documents show the answer is simple: he just asked. Yet despite inquiries, the DSHS can not justify many of the requirements and seems not to have thought them through.

Next week, the Texas Health and Human Services Commission Council will consider whether to adopt new abortion reporting requirements in the state–requirements that are being proposed at the behest of a Republican politician who failed to get his desired requirements passed through democratic means in the state legislature last year.

“The amendment wasn’t added,” Department of State Health Services press officer Carrie Williams told Rewire in April, “but at the time HHSC and DSHS agreed to look at the additional requirements and determine what elements could possibly be adopted by rule.”

Rewire filed a public information request for correspondence between Rep. Zedler’s office and the DSHS to find out how the department came to be catering to one anti-choice Republican’s demands. Documents show the answer is simple: mighty politely, in true friendly Texan style. Zedler’s office asked for what it wanted, and DSHS did its best to comply with their requests.

“… age, ethnicity, marital status, the municipality in which they live, highest level of education, age of the man who did the impregnating (“father of the unborn child,” in their language), method of contraception (the shitty kind, apparently), reason for the abortion (although they can decline to respond to that one), the number of previous live births, miscarriages and abortions, who referred the patient to the physician, how the abortion will be paid for, and whether the patients has read the required “printed information” about abortion, seen a sonogram, listened to the fetal heart monitor, and had all of it explained to them by the doctor.”

The new proposed requirements require ultrasound confirmation and confirmation that the abortion-seeking person has seen printed informational materials, in compliance with Texas’ new mandatory transvaginal ultrasound law, and add soliciting the abortion-seeking person’s highest level of education to the list of information already gathered: previous live births, induced abortions and age, race, residence and marital status.

Initially, the HHSC told Phil Fountain, Rep. Zedler’s Chief of Staff, via e-mail that while “it was a pleasure talking to [Fountain], as always,” his requests to ask abortion-seekers about their “education, contraceptive methods and father’s age would not fit under DSHS’ current authority in the statute.” Contraceptive methods and “father’s” age didn’t make the cut into the new requirements, but DSHS changed its mind about education, which did make the cut. Why? The department refuses to explain, saying only that “After closer consideration, it was determined it could be added to the draft for consideration and comment.”

As to who did the determining, and why and how the decision was made, DSHS refuses to say.

DSHS was more willing to comply with Zedler’s–via Fountain–requests for increased abortion complication reporting. The existing statute requires reporting on whether patients survived abortion, and if not, the cause of death. The new changes would require individual doctors to report abortion “complications” without defining the term, causing doctors to wonder, as Rewire reported earlier this spring, “whether, later on, the lack of direction from DSHS could be used to play “gotcha” with doctors when they don’t report complications the DSHS later determines to be relevant.”

So far, the only reason HHSC has given for any of its actions in this matter are that they’re putting into statute the personal wishes of Bill Zedler simply because he’s asked them to. When asked for even basic explanations in their reasoning, HHSC representatives only acknowledge the obvious: decisions were made. By whom? Based on what statute or precedent? With what intention in mind? To what end? Very simply: why? HHSC won’t say–and yet, they also say that they welcome public comment.

But it’s hard to imagine how the public can be expected to comment thoughtfully on these proposed changes when the changes themselves are the result of behind-the-scenes decisions made between willfully mute bureaucrats and agenda-driven legislators.

Perhaps HHSC truly put no reasoning at all behind any of its actions regarding new abortion reporting requirements–which would appear to be remarkably irresponsible, considering the real impact these requirements could have on the practices of Texas abortion providers and women seeking abortion. Perhaps HHSC believes its reasoning shouldn’t be subject to public scrutiny. Perhaps HHSC doesn’t think Texans deserve answers to reasonable questions. If so, telling Texans they’re “more than welcome to provide feedback” sends a mixed message when the only person the HHSC seems to truly hold themselves accountable to is one individual legislator.

]]>Censoring Doonesbury on Abortion: It’s So Sad It’s Not Even Funnyhttps://rewire.news/article/2012/03/12/doonesbury/
Mon, 12 Mar 2012 12:33:12 +0000What does it say about the state of our society when so many state legislators seem to make the passage of laws de-humanizing women their main priority, but newspapers are afraid of running comic strips satirizing these laws? Garry Trudeau, the brilliant political cartoonist, has produced a series on forced trans-vaginal sonogram laws in Texas, but papers in a number of the states with similar laws are not running it.

What does it say about the state of our society when so many state legislators seem to make the passage of laws de-humanizing women their main priority, but newspapers are afraid of running comic strips satirizing these laws?

Garry Trudeau, the brilliant political cartoonist, has produced a series on forced trans-vaginal sonogram laws in Texas, intended to run in all papers that syndicate his comic strip. The strip depicts a “shaming room” and counseling by ridiculous anti-choice legislators in an effort to drive home how harmful these laws are.

Except not all papers who regularly run Trudeau will run this week’s strip.

Doonesbury’s syndicate, United Features, has given papers that don’t want to run the strips a set of alternate cartoons. “Even though the real cartoons simply humanize the struggles of Texas women, many papers will call that “controversial,”” notes the Center for Reproductive Rights.

The list of papers taking smelling salts notably includes–in fact is weighted toward–outlets in states with the harshest anti-choice, anti-woman laws on the books or now being pushed by state legislatures. The Gainsville Sun and the Ocala Star-Banner in central Florida have refused to run the strip, for example, while the Florida legislature has passed restrictions on access to abortion for low-income women, young women, and just women women; mandates biased and medically inaccurate counseling for women seeking abortion; and has in place unnecessary TRAP laws (targeted regulation of providers) that have nothing to do with health and safety and everything to do with reducing access to safe abortion.

In Indiana, The Indianapolis Star has refused to run the strip as has the Pocono Record in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania. Writing at Colorlines about HB 1210, an anti-choice law passed in Indiana in 2011, Akiba Solomon states:

Among other heinousness, the law codifies what radical anti-choicers call ‘fetal pain,’ and requires a woman who has already decided to have an abortion to gaze at ultrasound images and listen for the flutter of a fetal heartbeat right before the emotionally charged procedure.

HB 1210 also strips existing and future Medicaid payments from “any entity that performs abortions or maintains or operates a facility where abortions are performed.” (Hospitals are exempt.) For those who don’t speak Radical Republicanese, “entity” means “Planned Parenthood,” which runs 28 health centers across the state.

Legislators in Pennsylvania, a state with high unemployment, high rates of poverty and many other problems, spent an astonishing 30 percent of their time last year on anti-choice laws, and yet have been kinda quiet lately on their own version of a state-sanctioned rape/mandatory trans-vaginal ultrasound law ever since Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell got in trouble for that one, though he passed an abusive mandatory ultrasound law anyway.

The Kansas City Star has decided that the topic is too hot for its comics page, but will run the series on its op-ed pages. Meanwhile, the state legislature is considering a 68-page bill of abortion restrictions that Rewire’s Kari Ann Rinker calls one of the most anti-choice laws in the nation.

Creating a divide between what laws are being passed and what we are willing to portray in satire is dangerous. Some editors have said the comic “goes over the line.” But if the comic goes over the line, what does that say about the law? And if we are willing to abuse the rights of individual people but not actually look at the reality of the state-sanctioned laws that do so, even in the form of satire, what does that say about the state of this democracy?

What it says to me is that in our society, it is apparently okay for the state to force a woman to undergo an unnecessary medical procedure–to humiliate her and to charge her for the costs of that humiliation–in order for her to subjugate herself enough to get what for her is a necessary–and legal–medical procedure, but not okay in the sensibilities of many newspaper editors to make such abuse visible to the public at large.

What it confirms for me is what I have believed for a long time… that the less “visible” are the human rights, economic, or social abuses we heap on people in this country–whether these take the form of mandatory ultrasounds to the shackling of pregnant or laboring women in prison to abstinence-only programs that de-humanize LGBT youth to the effects on low-income people of cuts in public transport, unemployment insurance and other social survival programs–the more we are willing to tolerate and in fact expand those abuses.

Because we don’t see them.

Some papers are stepping up. The Washington Postis running the cartoons, and the Cleveland Plain Dealer, is running the strip, because: “Garry Trudeau’s metier is political satire; if we choose to carry ‘Doonesbury,’ we can’t yank the strip every time it deals with a highly charged issue.”

Especially not when the rights and well-being of women throughout this country are daily affected by this “highly charged” issue human rights abuse and will continue to be so until we make them visible.

A correction was made to the above article at 2:00 pm on Monday, March 12th to correct the percentage of time spent by the Pennsylvania legislature on anti-choice legislation.

]]>Governor Bob McDonnell Signs Forced Ultrasound Bill, Raising Costs and Time Involved in Abortion Carehttps://rewire.news/article/2012/03/07/governor-bob-mcdonnell-signs-forced-ultrasound-bill/
Wed, 07 Mar 2012 15:49:57 +0000After weeks of protest in the state of Virginia and nationally, Governor Bob McDonnell signs a bill forcing women to have and pay out of pocket for an expensive and often medically-unnecessary medical procedure before they can terminate a pregnancy, suggesting it is an effort to "empower women."

After weeks of protest in the state of Virginia and nationally, Governor Bob McDonnell signs a bill forcing women to have and pay out of pocket for an expensive and often medically-unnecessary medical procedure before they can terminate a pregnancy. McDonnell, in taking all choice and power out of the hands of women and the medical professionals they have entrusted with their care, calls the bill an “effort to empower women.”

The bill, originally amended to remove a provision requiring a trans-vaginal ultrasound, which we contend constituted state-sponsored rape, now requires an abdominal ultrasound. The latter procedure is virtually useless for many early terminations of pregnancy because the embryo is not visible through abdominal ultrasound. The bill does say that “should a trans-vaginal ultrasound be needed, the doctor is required to offer it but the woman is allowed to refuse it.

Mandating an ultrasound that is not medically necessary of course ensures that you are both raising the costs of an abortion and also passing the costs onto the woman, because insurance will not cover medically unnecessary procedures

Moreover, the bill says the bill incorporates waiting periods for the ultrasound, increasing the time and costs of, for example, time off from work and child care. Doctors must make an offer of a trans-vaginal ultrasound, offer the woman a chance to view the ultrasound (whether trans-vaginal or abdominal) and hear it; the patient then has to certify she has seen the ultrasound, and the image produced–if one can be–has to be kept in her file. Doctors that don’t follow these guidelines face a civil fine of $2500.00. This is a common method of harassment of abortion providers… set up lots of requirements that have nothing to do with patient safety or medical necessity, and then constantly harrass doctors to make sure they are “complying. has to be kept in there, if not all complied with specifically, then face a civil.

The bill had little support in the state.

“The evidence is stacking up that Bob McDonnell is willfully out of touch with Virginia families,” said Anna Scholl, executive director of ProgressVA.

“Faced with the opposition of 55 % of Virginians, 33,000 petition signatures, and thousands of protestors on Capitol Square, McDonnell chose to answer the calls of extremists in his own party rather than those of his constituents. This move makes clear that Bob McDonnell prioritizes his national political aspirations over the well being of Virginia families.”

“The bill is an unprecedented invasion of privacy and government intrusion into the doctors’ offices and living rooms of Virginia women,” said Tarina Keene, Executive Director of NARAL Pro-Choice Virginia.

“Governor McDonnell’s unwillingness to listen to the thousands of women across the Commonwealth who are outraged by this political overreach into their lives shows nothing more than arrogance.”

Another bill working its way through the Virginia legislature contains a provision repealing current funding for low-income women to get Medicaid funding for assistance in paying for abortions in pregnancies involving fetal anomalies.

Repeal of this funding means that women already struggling economically and facing pregnancies gone tragically wrong must carry to term, a form of coercion one advocate called “cruel and disgusting.”

]]>Alabama State Senator Greg Reed says that his ultrasound company, Preferred Medical Systems, would in no way financially benefit if a mandatory ultrasound law passes in the state. After all, he argues, his company doesn’t do business with abortion providers.

Tell that to the abortion provider he tried to sell equipment to a few months earlier.

Editor’s note: This article was amended at 10:33 a.m. on Monday, March 5th to correct an error of omission. An earlier draft with the link back to Style Weekly was lost and has now been re-inserted. The original reporting on this story comes from Style Weekly.

You might think that the right wing in this country was getting the message that women will no longer stand for legal, verbal, and physical abuse and harassment, especially by elected officials. You would especially think that would be the case in Virginia where former Vice Presidential aspirant Governor Bob McDonnell, who is contemplating signing into law a forced ultrasound bill after doing women a “favor” and taking out the forced trans-vaginal ultrasounds initially required, has been widely pilloried. You would also think the right-wing would be cautious after a week in which the seemingly untouchable Rush Limbaugh has, as of this writing, lost seven corporate sponsors over his debasing remarks about Sandra Fluke.

But you would be wrong.

Because, you see, women in this country are so dangerous, their sense of entitlement as citizens so incredibly threatening to the peace of the republic that state police in riot gear were sent to remove peaceful protestors this past weekend. According to a news article in the Richmond independent news source Style Weekly:

Photos by Scott Elmquist, Style Weekly

“About a thousand women’s rights protestors descended on the state Capitol Saturday afternoon to protest anti-abortion legislation in the General Assembly, and then things got ugly,” reports Style Weekly’s Vernal Colman.

“About 20 State Police officers, many in swat gear with face shields and body armor, were called in to assist Capitol Police in controlling the crowd. Some of the State Police officers wore green camouflage and carried rifles and canisters of tear gas (no tear gas was used, however). After being warned to vacate the south steps of the Capitol, police officers arrested 31 people — 14 men and 17 women — on charges ranging from unlawful assembly to trespassing, according to Capitol Police.”

The rally ended a raucous two weeks in the statehouse, with anti-abortion legislation generating national headlines in a Republican-controlled General Assembly. While legislation granting unborn children “personhood” status was shelved until next year and a bill requiring invasive, transvaginal ultrasounds prior to abortions was watered down at the request of Gov. Bob McDonnell, women’s rights protestors descended onto Capitol Square nonetheless.

Photos by Scott Elmquist, Style Weekly

Colman continues: Organizers for the event, Speak Loudly With Silence, say that an estimated 1,000 people participated in the rally, which also involved members of the Occupy Richmond movement.”

Claire Tuite says that the arrests were not planned. When the protestors emerged on the Capitol, some made an “autonomous decision” to “occupy” the steps of the Capitol building.”

“This was a peaceful protest on taxpayer-funded property,” Tuite says. “We have every right to be here.”

Josh Kadrich, one of the organizers, says a small group broke off from the larger crowd of protestors, determined to make it to the steps. They blew by the cops standing on the steps leading towards the capitol. Others joined in. “Eventually, there were around 400 people sitting on the steps of the capitol in silence to protect women’s rights,” Kadrich says.

Then State Police, many officers in riot gear, showed up. The protestors were asked to leave and given a countdown as to when the police would begin making arrests. Some complied peacefully. Others locked arms and resisted.

Photos by Scott Elmquist, Style Weekly

Colman writes: “Molly Vice, press liaison for the group, says the arrests “shames lawmakers for passing regressive legislation that usurps the good judgment of women on their own health care for the state’s.

“It’s an outrage,” she says of the ultrasound bill. “We’re here … to tell truth to power that infringing on women’s health is not okay. Not this year or the next.”

]]>Violation by Ultrasound: Not Just Physicalhttps://rewire.news/article/2012/02/27/while-some-ultrasound-bills-strive-physical-violation-others-would-commit-violati/
Mon, 27 Feb 2012 07:10:52 +0000While there has been much fury recently over Virginia’s recently proposed transvaginal ultrasound bill, other states’ anti-choice lawmakers have chosen the equally unacceptable route of psychological—rather than physical—violation of women.

While there has been much fury recently over Virginia’s recently proposed transvaginal ultrasound bill, other states’ anti-choice lawmakers have chosen the equally unacceptable route of psychological—rather than physical—violation of women.

In Michigan, House Bill 4433 would expand the state’s already-present requirements for pre-abortion ultrasounds. If passed (a likely outcome in Michigan’s strongly anti-choice state government) the law will require pre-abortion ultrasounds to be conducted with the “most technologically advanced ultrasound equipment available,” further defined as the equipment which “is capable of providing the most visibly clear image of the gross anatomical development of the fetus and the most audible fetal heartbeat.” While the bill states that a woman be given the “option” to view the ultrasound or not, it also mandates that the monitors must be turned toward the woman, so that her only way of not viewing the image is to close her eyes or turn her head away. The bill also requires that the professional performing the ultrasound give a detailed description of the fetus’ current developmental stage, and must offer the woman a printed ultrasound image.

Clearly, even if reasonable arguments could be made in favor of medical benefits to a physician viewing a more detailed ultrasound image before performing an abortion, there is no medical benefit to be gained by forcing the patient to view such images. It would be impossible to read this bill as anything other than a transparent attempt to convince women not to go through with abortions. And it aims to enact such coercion by relying on an essentialist view of women and “motherhood:” the notion that women will be emotionally moved to continue a pregnancy if they are forced to see the fetus and hear a detailed report of its development.

Women who have made the choice to obtain an abortion are well aware of the choice they have made. They are not naïve to the fact that they are choosing to abort a developing fetus. Whether the decision has been an easy or a difficult one, it has not been made in ignorance of what “abortion” entails. And it is not the place of the state to patronize women by insisting that they be forced to view ultrasound images in order to fully understand their actions.

Requiring transvaginal ultrasounds would violate women by invading their bodies. Turning an ultrasound monitor toward a woman and attempting to force her to view the images even if she does not want to see them is an act of emotional and psychological violation. Both are medically unnecessary and needlessly cruel and patronizing. And neither should ever be mandated by a state’s government.

Now, however, angling for a role as Vice President in the 2012 election, watching the backlash against the far right’s efforts to politicize women’s health, and after a week of intense media scrutiny of a plan to mandate trans-vaginal ultrasounds (including by Rewire) medical evidence has suddenly become very, very important to the governor.

In a statement today, the governor said:

“This session, the General Assembly is now considering amending [an] informed consent statute to include a requirement that any woman seeking an abortion receive an ultrasound in order to establish the gestational age for appropriate medical purposes, and to offer a woman the opportunity to voluntarily review that ultrasound prior to giving her legal informed consent to abortion.

Over the past days I have discussed the specific language of the proposed legislation with other governors, physicians, attorneys, legislators, advocacy groups, and citizens. It is apparent that several amendments to the proposed legislation are needed to address various medical and legal issues which have arisen. It is clear that in the majority of cases, a routine external, transabdominal ultrasound is sufficient to meet the bills stated purpose, that is, to determine gestational age. I have come to understand that the medical practice and standard of care currently guide physicians to use other procedures to find the gestational age of the child, when abdominal ultrasounds cannot do so. Determining gestational age is essential for legal reasons, to know the trimester of the pregnancy in order to comply with the law, and for medical reasons as well.”

This, he continues:

“…having looked at the current proposal, I believe there is no need to direct by statute that further invasive ultrasound procedures be done. Mandating an invasive procedure in order to give informed consent is not a proper role for the state. No person should be directed to undergo an invasive procedure by the state, without their consent, as a precondition to another medical procedure.”

Just read this sentence again:

I have come to understand that the medical practice and standard of care currently guide physicians to use other procedures to find the gestational age of the child, when abdominal ultrasounds cannot do so.

Translation? “I have ignored the evidence to such an extent and painted myself so far into a corner that I now need to rely on medical evidence I otherwise love to ignore to save my own ass.”

Still, while welcome news, the governor does not go nearly far enough.

He is still recommending to the General Assembly “a series of amendments to this bill.”

“I am requesting that the General Assembly amend this bill to explicitly state that no woman in Virginia will have to undergo a transvaginal ultrasound involuntarily. I am asking the General Assembly to state in this legislation that only a transabdominal, or external, ultrasound will be required to satisfy the requirements to determine gestational age. Should a doctor determine that another form of ultrasound may be necessary to provide the necessary images and information that will be an issue for the doctor and the patient. The government will have no role in that medical decision.”

The way I read it, he’s still mandating ultrasounds, if not trans-vaginal ones. He is still using law to address a medical and public health issue long settled by experts. He is still putting up obstacles to women making decisions about their lives and their bodies, and their families.

And he still has laws on the books that contravene his new-found belief in medical standards of care and prevailing medical practices.

In short, he’s still coercing women and providers. He’s just taken the ultrasound wand “out of the picture.”